Providing defense mechanisms against computer hackers and attacks on computing infrastructure has been an increasingly significant concern with the growing importance of network-based computing. With the growth of network-based computing over the Internet and the growing reliance on commercial network-based computing services, protecting computers and servers connected to a network from malicious network-based attacks has become a significant issue for businesses and organizations. For example, hackers may attack a computing service over a network using denial-of-service (DOS) attacks. SYN flooding is a type of a DOS attack. In a SYN flood attack, an attacker sends a large number of SYN (synchronize) packets to a target system in an attempt to overload the target system's resources so that the target is unable to respond to legitimate SYN packets, and other legitimate requests. Computing service providers must account for and protect against such attacks while maintaining an effective level of service to their customers.